On April 21, CFER, member co-plaintiffs and the American Civil Rights Project (ACR Project) filed a lawsuit in Sacramento to challenge the state’s Black Infant Health (BIH) program. In the legal action, we argue that the State of California has engaged in racial discrimination through BIH, violating the U.S. and California Constitutions, as well as Title VI in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Since 1989, the California Department of Public Health has maintained this program, handing out favorable treatment to pregnant women and newborns on the basis of race. At the beginning, BIH was promoted as an initiative to equalize health outcomes for Black mothers and children as compared to those from other groups. It has been 37 years since the program’s inception and the state has no plan to transition the program from a racially exclusionary premise to a race-neutral one. Dispensing this public benefit based on race violates:

· The Equal Protection Clause in the U.S. Constitution

· Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

· Provisions of the California Constitution, including its Equal Protection Clause (Article I, Section 7) and—to the extent BIH operates through contracts—Prop. 209(Article I, Section 31)

Answering CFER’s call for plaintiffs , three courageous CFER members agreed to join the lawsuit as representative taxpayers. Our lawsuit also compliments a parallel class-action challenge in the launched by another CFER member in federal court with the help of the Pacific Legal Foundation.

[First name], there is no question that protecting the health of all pregnant women and newborns—of all races—is a worthy social goal. When governments go beyond that kind of laudable commitment to advance the health and safety of only pregnant women and newborns of a single race to the exclusion of others, that’s something else entirely.

We are asking that the Sacramento Superior Court declare the BIH program unconstitutional and illegal, issue a writ of mandamus commanding the state to cease using state resources or funds to support it so long as it continues to discriminate on the basis of race, and for related preliminary and permanent injunctive relief.

Once again, the wheels of justice turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine. We have seen the fruitful outcomes of CFER’s legal advocacy in many past cases and we believe we will prevail again. If you have any information on potentially unconstitutional public programs throughout California, can you please let us know?